Amherst

by William Nicholson

  “Is it over?”

  A voice small as a child’s. That’s what it does to you: you’re ready to hand yourself over on a plate.

  “Yes. It’s over now.”

  “But our magical night isn’t over?”

  “Almost,” he says.

  He leads her to one of the deep couches he pushed against the wall, and they sink down among the soft cushions.

  “I want you to kiss me, Nick.”

  He kisses her. She holds him close, needing to feel all of him.

  “I’m not in love with you, Nick.”

  “Of course you aren’t.”

  “But you are lovely. Thank you for my magical night.”

  “My magical night too.”

  “I’m not at all hungry.”

  “Me neither.”

  “Will we sleep together tonight?”

  “If that’s what you’d like.”

  “Yes,” she says. “I’d like that.”

  She snuggles into him. She thinks what a nice smell he has. Her body can still feel his body pressed to hers, spinning round the dance floor.

  “Will we do it again?” she says. “Now you’ve taught me.”

  “I don’t think so,” he says.

  Why not? Is he going away? It comes to her then that he’s planned this whole evening, the candles and the champagne and the dancing, for a purpose. It’s a valediction.

  “Are you going away?”

  “Yes,” he says.

  “When?”

  “Soon.”

  Now she knows her instinct is right.

  “You’re leaving tomorrow, aren’t you?”

  “That’s the plan.”

  That’s the plan. So all along there’s been a plan. She feels the dread gathering in her stomach. She shuts her eyes, and has a short, sharp tussle with herself.

  Get a grip. He’s not your boyfriend. You’re not in love with him. He’s free to go when he likes, where he likes.

  “So what’s this plan?”

  “I suppose it comes under the general heading of moving on.”

  “You’re leaving this house?”

  “This is Peggy’s house. She’s been very tolerant. But I should go.”

  “Where will you go?”

  He doesn’t answer that. So she’s not to know. Not to know and not to follow.

  Hold on tight. This is not a tragedy. You’ve had some fun. It was never meant to last.

  “Will you be okay?” she says.

  That touches him, her concern for him. He strokes her cheek.

  “Yes. I’ll be okay.”

  “I think there’s a bit of you that could be quite sad,” she says.

  “You’re right there.”

  But you’re not sad with me. We have fun together. We have magical nights.

  “Will I see you again?” she says.

  “No. I don’t think so.”

  “You might be in England one day. I might come back here.”

  Nothing from Nick. She tries to stop the feeling but it’s there. A little hurt, a little angry.

  “If we’re never to see each other again, what was the point of tonight?”

  “Oh, Alice. Don’t say that.”

  “I’m not saying anything. I’m only asking.”

  “Can’t we just have a good time together, without it being some kind of down payment on something more?”

  “Yes,” she says. “Yes, we can.”

  She feels ashamed; she hadn’t meant to sound needy. But then she thinks, It’s not being needy. If you have a good time with someone, it’s natural to want to do it again. It doesn’t mean you’re in love or anything.

  “I’m just saying we had fun,” she says. “That’s all.”

  “I wanted to see if I could make someone happy,” he says. “At least for one night.”

  “You can,” she says. “You did.”

  Someone was happy. Someone loved it more than she had allowed for. Someone is now wanting it not to end.

  “Nick, if you’re going away, does that mean I should leave too?”

  “No, not at all,” he says. “I’ve spoken to Peggy. The room’s yours as long as you want it.”

  “So I’d be in the house alone?”

  “Actually, I think Peggy’s planning on coming back any day now. Maybe tomorrow.”

  This is all so strange. He speaks in a matter-of-fact voice, as if it’s the most natural thing in the world, but she’s never met Peggy, and Peggy was his wife, and she is or was his lover, however briefly.

  “There’s something else you should know,” he says. “Tonight’s meant a lot to me. You’ve been wonderful. Everything I could have wished for. Thank you.”

  “Thank you too, Nick.”

  Then for no reason at all she starts to cry. She stops herself as soon as she realizes it’s happening, and snuffles a bit, and dabs away the tears.

  “Too much champagne,” she says. “I’m falling apart.”

  “Let’s go up.”

  She sleeps with him that night in the big bed in the master bedroom. They make love without words, holding each other close, and for the moment it’s as if they’re dancing again. Then they sleep.

  • • •

  In the morning she wakes to find herself alone. She gets up and goes downstairs. The yard door is open, the screen door propped back with a duffel bag. Nick is carrying stuff out to his truck.

  She stands shivering in the cold breeze, watching him load his life into the truck. Then he’s done and he comes and gives her a good-bye kiss.

  “As easy as that?” she says. “Load up. Move on.”

  “As easy as that.”

  “You take care of yourself, Nick Crocker.”

  “You too.”

  He climbs into the cab and drives off. As easy as that.

  Alice shuts the door, goes into the kitchen, and brews herself a pot of coffee. When the coffee starts to trickle into the jug, she starts to cry. There’s no one to see her so she doesn’t try to stop herself. She cries and cries.

  Fuck you, Nick. How come it turns out I’m in love with you after all?

  19

  As interest in the poems of Emily Dickinson grew, Mabel Todd, their editor, began to receive requests to give talks. Her first lecture was at the Springfield Women’s Club. She began with an account of Emily’s life as she understood it, then spoke of her struggle to get the poems published, and concluded by reading some of the poems aloud. She was gratified to discover that she was a natural speaker. The rapt attention of an audience brought out the best in her. It was both a performance and a presentation of her real self. All agreed that the evening was a great success.

  At her next talk, to the College Alumni Club of Boston, Austin was in the audience. He looked on with pride as she enthralled her listeners, among whom were several newspaper critics.

  “Now all the world will love you,” he told her afterwards.

  “So long as you love me,” she replied, “that’s enough for me.”

  But the acclaim did make a difference. Life in Amherst was made harder for her every day by Sue’s increasingly open hostility. Mabel begged Austin to confront his wife on the issue.

  “I’m sure she believes that if she can make me miserable enough, you’ll give me up and go back to her.”

  “She’s a fool if she thinks any such thing.”

  “Have you spoken to her? Have you told her in plain words that you love me in a way that you can never love her?”

  “For pity’s sake, Mabel! How can any man say such a thing to the woman who’s the mother of his children?”

  “Then how is she to know?”

  To Mabel it seemed so clear. For as long as Sue had hopes of regaining her husband’s love, she would do all in her power to destroy her rival.

  “My dearest darling, don’t you see? You must talk to her. You must make her accept it’s all over between you.”

  “Well, well. I’ll see what can be done.”

  Austin did
talk to his wife, though perhaps not with the frankness Mabel hoped for. He addressed her with angry pride, as her husband and lord and master. He meant to make it plain that it was not for her to question his conduct.

  “I expect you, as my wife, to be civil to anyone I choose to call my friend.”

  Sue responded humbly, glad of the chance to air the matter at last.

  “I think Mrs. Todd is rather more than a friend,” she said.

  “And if she is, that is my concern.”

  “And you, Austin, are my concern,” said Sue. “I’m not entirely blind. I can see that this woman has bewitched you. I can see how much you admire her. You’re such a good and upright man, Austin. I pray that she doesn’t take advantage of that goodness.”

  “I can assure you,” he said coldly, “that Mrs. Todd is as good and as upright as you or I.”

  “You are my husband,” said Sue. “You are the one and only man in my life. All the love a woman has for a man I have for you alone. Mrs. Todd has a husband too. Does she not love him? And if she does, what portion of her heart is left for you?”

  “That is for Mrs. Todd to say.”

  He turned away, displeased.

  “No, Austin, don’t go. Please understand. I’m so afraid you’re going to be hurt by her. Don’t you see? Women like her don’t love, they want only to be loved. By you, by her husband, by all the world.”

  “I have nothing more to say on the subject.”

  He reported this conversation back to Mabel with great indignation.

  “David indeed! She seemed to think your feelings towards him were to be spoken of in the same breath as your love for me! What could I say? It made me want to take out your letters and read her passages aloud, and say to her, ‘That is love! That is devotion! That is the true sacred flame that can burn between a man and a woman!’ ”

  “But you didn’t, I presume.”

  “What we are to each other,” cried Austin, in full flow, “the height and the depth of it, the totality of it, how can there be any room left for any other love? But merely because in the eyes of the world he has the name of your husband, and because you continue to show him a proper respect, she presumes on feelings in you, and manipulations, and double-dealings, and I don’t know what!”

  “Would it make your wife happier if I were to separate myself from David?”

  “No! It would terrify her!”

  “Then I don’t see what I’m to do.”

  Austin took her in his arms and kissed her.

  “Love me as you do,” he said. “Love me forever, as I love you. There’s nothing else either of us need do. This is everything.”

  So she kissed him, and said no more.

  Powerless to alter the status quo, Mabel and Austin dreamed of escaping it together. Whenever they were able to steal time alone, they drove in Austin’s carriage round the neighboring hills, in search of the ideal plot of land where they could build a secret home. They dressed up this fantasy with every kind of detail. Their love nest was to be on a hilltop, commanding immense views of the landscape, so that they could watch the sun and the rain sweep from valley to valley. It would have open porches on all four sides, where they could sit and listen to the crickets. Austin would have a room for his work and his books; Mabel would have a room where she could sit undisturbed and write her lectures. There would be a cozy living room, with two comfortable chairs before the fireplace. There would be a curving staircase, and at the top a light, pretty bedroom, and a bed that they would share.

  They talked about their house as if the building of it could begin any day, and waited only on the finding of the perfect spot.

  “I shall decorate the walls with stencils,” Mabel said. “With patterns of trees, and birds.”

  “I’ll want a good stable,” said Austin. “Tom and Dick must come with us.”

  They considered plots in the Leverett hills, and by Mount Holyoke, and across the river in Whately and Deerfield. It was a way of believing that there was a future waiting for them, in which all the obstacles to their love had fallen away. Sometimes, for Mabel in particular, the image of their house on the hill was so clear in her mind that it was almost as if it already existed. But it was no more than a dream. In reality, their times together were stolen, and all too brief.

  In compensation, Mabel’s new career as a lecturer blossomed. Her talks on Emily Dickinson, given in private houses and public places, were turning her into a minor celebrity. She was invited to lunches and dinners and began contributing book reviews to periodicals. Letters to Austin reported success after success.

  Should have liked to have seen you in your cloud of glory Wednesday night,

  Austin wrote to her,

  and tomorrow night you dazzle them again. Well, that is all right, but hadn’t you rather be out in the woods with me?

  As Mabel’s life expanded, Austin’s began to decline. He was not well. He was plagued by a persistent cough, which his doctor diagnosed as a problem of the palate. A small operation left him in agony, unable to swallow. Sue nursed him at home in the Evergreens, feeding him milk punch. Mabel found herself shut out, unable to see him or even get a letter to him. Frantic with worry, she got her news from Vinnie and by waylaying Dr. Cooper on the streets of Amherst. She wrote notes and entrusted them to Vinnie, who smuggled them in to Austin on his sickbed. While the news remained uncertain, she stayed in Amherst, waiting on the bulletins, unable to read or work. Then as word came that Austin was improving, Mabel found Amherst unbearable again. She could not endure that Sue saw him, nursed him, comforted him, while she herself, his true love, had all doors closed against her. She left for Boston, plunging herself into a round of lectures, starting with the New England Women’s Club.

  Austin recovered. Mabel returned to Amherst. They met as they had done in the early days of their love, in the dining room of the Homestead, where Vinnie now lived alone. They sat side by side together on the black horsehair sofa, holding hands, murmuring aloud their old prayer.

  “For my beloved is mine, and I am his. What can we want beside? Nothing!”

  Mabel was shocked and frightened to see how weak he had grown.

  “If you need to return to your bed, my darling, you must do it.”

  “But how am I to see you?”

  “It doesn’t matter if we don’t see each other for a while. All that matters is that you get well again. If that means I must leave you to her care, then I do it gladly. Let her nurse you back to health, and to me.”

  Austin returned to his sickroom. He was tired, but he found it hard to sleep. He had no appetite, and suffered from frequent bouts of nausea. A new doctor, Dr. Bigelow, described his condition as “nervous exhaustion.” Austin found it increasingly hard even to write the notes he was sending to Mabel.

  Mabel for her part wrote him daily letters in which she poured out her anxiety and love, but Vinnie no longer came to collect them, feeling unable to take the letters into the sickroom. Mabel kept writing anyway, telling herself that Austin would read them when he was well again.

  In sympathy with his suffering, paralyzed by powerlessness, she found herself also unable to sleep or eat.

  David kept Mabel company and joined in her prayers for Austin, and did his best to persuade her to look after herself. It was mid-August now, and a warm sun shone out of a deep-blue sky, seemingly indifferent to the slow crisis unfolding in the Evergreens. David urged Mabel to go out in the fresh air, but she would not, choosing instead the protection of darkened rooms. She could not bear to walk the summer lanes. The woods and hills belonged to Austin; she had loved nature with him and through him. Without him the world was empty and cold.

  Then the weather changed. Rain clouds rolled across the Connecticut Valley. The grey skies dressed the world in the somber colors of her thoughts. As the rain passed, Mabel ventured out at last, on her own, and walked a little way up the Leverett road. She cried as she walked, but the wind dried her tears and she became calmer. To the east, in the d
istance, she could see rain falling over the hills.

  “God save my beloved,” she prayed. “God, make him well again.”

  Then she spoke aloud Emily’s lines, which she knew by heart.

  “Oh God, why give, if thou must take away the loved?”

  After praying she walked on quietly. Then she felt the warmth of the sun and, turning, found the clouds had parted to the west. Over the Pelham Hills rain was still falling. There was a shimmer in the sky, and a rainbow formed, clear and bright and beautiful. She gazed at it in wonder. Surely this was God’s answer to her prayer! The rainbow seemed to speak to her, telling her God was merciful, there was hope yet, God smiled on their love.

  No longer crying, she hurried home and said to David, “He will get better. I’m sure of it.”

  The next day Dr. Cooper reported a distinct and surprising change in Austin’s condition. His pulse was stronger. Hope was returning.

  Mabel wrote in her long unsent letter:

  10th August 1895, Saturday morning: My darling, my darling, I wonder if the time seems long to you since you held me in your arms, and if you would not like to have me come in now and kiss you, and take your dear hand in mine. I have solemnly promised God that when you are well again, and I feel your beloved arms around me again, and I know I have you safe, that from that hour I will live up to the best and highest there is in me, and make you happy as I never did before. Only God has a faint conception of how I love you—nothing human can compass such knowledge—unless you know. If you had died, it would have been the utter end of my life.

  Very slowly, but surely, oh my heart’s beloved, you are getting back, and you will be in life again. How simple for me to come in and see you, and kiss you and love you into health! And yet China is nearer in possibility. But my darling, get well and come back to me, and I will try not to repine at any circumstance. I belong utterly to you.

  Tuesday morning, 13th August: Do you hear the crickets, our crickets, my beloved, at twilight? And when you hear them do you think of me? I sat on the east piazza last evening, listening to them, and again in front of the house, until it seemed to me you must be with me. Do you hear them, sweetheart?